A new year, and more reports are emerging about how foreign workers are being exploited by Australian businesses.
This time the culprit is a labour-hire company, Global Express Consultancy Pty Ltd, which has underpaid foreign workers supplying pastries, vitamin pills and desserts to businesses including Coles, Woolworths and airline companies. From The Canberra Times:
The 19 employees from Taiwan and Hong Kong were in Australia on the 417 working holiday visa. They were allegedly underpaid between February 2014 and May 2015 while working at three factories…
The Fair Work Ombudsman has alleged the workers were underpaid and that some had bonds of up to $300 unlawfully deducted from their wages. The employees were allegedly underpaid their minimum hourly rates, casual loadings, Saturday penalty rates and overtime.
This latest report of exploitation of course follows in the wake of the joint Fairfax-Four Corners investigation into 7-Eleven’s dodgy labour hiring practices, reports of widespread wages fraud at Pizza Hut franchisees, among others.
We also shouldn’t forget the Senate’s interim report into Australia’s temporary work visa programs, released in October, which found that the Working Holiday Maker (WHM) visa system has been subject to widespread rorting, with “stark” reports of “systemic abuse” , including the deliberate and systemic underpayment of wages, excessive work hours, and fraudulent record keeping.
Then there’s Australia’s temporary “skilled” 457 visa system, which has seen foreign workers flood into the cities to work in professions that are either not particularly “skilled”, in short supply, or critical to the economy, such as cooks/chefs, cafe/restaurant staff, call centre/customer service, and accounting. 80% of these workers have also not undergone any kind of labour market testing to determine whether an Australian is available to do the job.
When viewing the above cases there is one word that springs to mind: “systemic”. The abuse and rorting of Australia’s foreign worker visa system are not isolated, but rather widespread, encompassing students and so-called “skilled” and unskilled workers alike.
